Thursday, May 1, 2014

April

I took April on as if it were my personal play thing, a yo-yo on a string. It doesn’t help that on its own, April, is respectively the most foolish month of the year. Day 1 says it all, doesn’t it?

I rode the waves of bi-polar mania on a heady mix of euphoria. The other day when the psychiatrist asked if I felt euphoric, I said honestly “No.”, but the truth was I wasn’t feeling euphoria, because I was “euphoria” incarnate.

Places like the inpatient behavioral health wing are a strange place to meet life long connections, but if my research and my life has taught me anything that is exactly where you meet your fate. On the road you took to avoid it.

You may find yourself in the dark corners of The Universe and when you’re ready to show up for your life, the path reveals itself to you step by step. The long and winding road brings us together once more.

Surrender of control isn’t the process of surrendering ALL control, just as positive psychology, as a profession, isn’t all about the positives, but rather how we make light of the more meaning less moments of our life, the dark days. Making the most of what we are given and embracing “the suck” when those days come is part of living a full, rich and meaningful life.

Just remember when you’re having one of those days:

“Honey Mama said there will be days like this!”

Our consciousness creates a space in our worlds that allows us to explore deep intellectual conversation and debate within the confines of the mind. In the final scene of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe we are reminded that you can’t go in to Narnia all the time, but a reminder or two hangs around as calm pacification for the mind, to remind us of where we came from and where we are going in life.

I read a quote the other day that said something to the effect of the mere meaninglessness of life requires we assign meaning to it. It’s truth. We all deny reality as it smacks us in the face, if we didn’t we wouldn’t survive. Our ability to survive and thrive requires we bypass some of the fine print and sign on the line: I choose to live. What do you choose?

I’ve been two steps ahead of my life since before I took my first breaths, I had to be, if I had not been so intrepid in my entry to the world, I would have died. Two-step. Always two steps ahead.

This is why my connections with society can feel sorted, because I was rarely living in the Now. I’d drifted into the confines of my mind in search of becoming a writer and I wrote my way through the darkest and scariest moments of my early life, which created severe stress and lack of mental health services available in our rural community.

I am to be the voice of mental health services and community healing for rural communities, I know, because I’ve been there. Life at The Moose Lodge was paradoxically the Dickens nature of life on the North edge of Wrangell-Saint Elias NP/P, “it was a best of times, worst of times” scenario.

An abundance of activities our family loves to do paired with isolation that felt peaceful, but the positives masked the crushing isolation. Our neighbors are friends, and the community has embraced us, but I just could not let myself into that life, not fully. I knew I was meant to be someplace else, so I couldn’t get comfortable.

I knew because I am one of those People who NEEDS people. I love people. I love that Barbara Streisand song “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.”. The irony of it is that I have severe social anxiety, which may come as a surprise to my family and friends, but I do. I’ve been suffering from crushing anxiety for YEARS. Not anymore. I have nothing to hide. Here I am. I choose to live in the Now.

My drive to create was born out of a desire to leave my fingerprints on something real, honest, pure and good. Words and stories is how I assign the mere meaningless moments of life meaning which allows me to live life to the fullest. I’ve turned the volume down and am heading out into this day filled with Possibility and hope. This month started off as April Fool’s but settled on the last day in April is Honesty Day. Life is Good. Happy May Day!